The smoke fiend is kept well within bounds in Garden City; for all machinery is driven by electric energy, with the result that the cost of electricity for lighting and other purposes is greatly reduced.
— from Garden Cities of To-Morrow Being the Second Edition of "To-Morrow: a Peaceful Path to Real Reform" by Howard, Ebenezer, Sir

XX DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER, I did not send my last letters so soon as I hoped, because John (whether my master mistrusts or no, I can't say) had been sent to Lady Davers's instead of Isaac, who used to go; and I could not be so free with, nor so well trust Isaac; though he is very civil to me too.
— from Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson

She ran over the rickety bridge and looked for a minute into the water, in order to feel giddy; then, shrieking and laughing, ran to the other side to the drying-shed, and she fancied that all the men were admiring her, even Kerbalay.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

As fiend and man in combat met, As when in some dark wood's retreat An elephant and a lion meet.
— from The Rámáyan of Válmíki, translated into English verse by Valmiki

He had been once for a moment in the old office but long ago.
— from Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

See the same young man six months later, you will not know him; from his bold conversation, his fashionable maxims, his easy air, you would take him for another man, if his jests over his former simplicity and his shame when any one recalls it did not show that it is he indeed and that he is ashamed of himself.
— from Emile by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

“Of course I was depressed by bad dreams, but why have I dreamt of you looking like that?” “Come, let’s have done with dreams,” he said impatiently, turning to her in spite of her prohibition, and perhaps the same expression gleamed for a moment in his eyes again.
— from The Possessed (The Devils) by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

His mind fumbled, for a moment, in the darkness, he took off his spectacles, wiped the glasses, passed his hands over his eyes, but saw no light until he found himself face to face with a wholly different idea, the realisation that he must endeavour, in the coming month, to send Odette six or seven thousand-franc notes instead of five, simply as a surprise for her and to give her pleasure.
— from Swann's Way by Marcel Proust

“For a moment I thought you had done something clever.
— from The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle

He delighted in enlarging an opponent's assertion to a forced inference ridiculous in form and monstrous in dimensions.
— from Abraham Lincoln, a History — Volume 02 by John G. (John George) Nicolay

Father Ignatius had often wished and prayed that, like his Divine Lord, like St. Francis Xavier, and like his dear friend and master in the spiritual life, Father Dominic, he might die at his post, yet deserted and alone.
— from Life of Father Ignatius of St. Paul, Passionist (The Hon. & Rev. George Spencer). by Pius a Sp. Sancto (Pius a Spiritu Sancto)

But whar's the gude thousand pund Scots that I lent ye, man, and when am I to see it again?" "Where it is," replied my guide, after the affectation of considering for a moment, "I cannot justly tell—probably where last year's snaw is.
— from Rob Roy — Volume 02 by Walter Scott

They were so much finer and more interesting than the common, every-day prints of the dealers that they quite took our breath away.
— from The Spell of Japan by Isabel Anderson

For a moment I held him, his savage face glared into mine, his huge paws were on my chest, he stood on his hind legs, the incarnation of brute strength.
— from Fast as the Wind: A Novel by Nat Gould

He paused for a moment in the shelter of a spruce to fill his pipe and light it.
— from God's Country—And the Woman by James Oliver Curwood

“You will recognize the name of the person who sends it, and you will find a message in it for me.”
— from The New Magdalen by Wilkie Collins

He did not for a moment imagine that Meade would fail to take advantage of this golden opportunity to crush the Army of Virginia and end the war.
— from Chancellorsville and Gettysburg Campaigns of the Civil War - VI by Abner Doubleday